Kudos to the unnamed reader who alerted columnist Bob Cringely to the immense implications of the new iTunes Affiliate program program.

The power of the RIAA and its members has always lain in money and marketing. The big record companies were able to pay large advances to top acts, and their marketing organizations were able to make small bands into bigger bands by aggressively promoting them and supporting tours.

[iTunes Affiliates] is the end of the RIAA and the big recording industry. Apple in the last year has signed deals with more than 300 independent record labels, most of them not big enough to do much promotion. But now they don't have to because that promotion will be handled by mtv.com and every music web logger, now that they have a material incentive to make recommendations and print lists. If I recommend a song -- IF I JUST TYPE A FEW WORDS -- and a thousand people decide to download based on my recommendation, heck, I just made $50 bucks. This is like sending tens of thousands of record sales people out on the road except that they can sell anything THEY like -- any of the one million iTunes songs -- making them salespeople with real conviction and maybe even with good taste. Maybe.

The RIAA will love the added revenue from this program until it becomes clear that they've been supplanted, at which point, it will no longer matter.